Face to Face put their differences behind them and release new album
Words by Anthony Giannotti
Yes Face to Face did break up, but who cares? They’re back together and on a worldwide tour for their new album, Laugh Now, Laugh Later, released May 17, 2011. Lead singer and guitarist Trever Keith has one simple thing to say about the split: “We had some creative differences and now we don’t.” After 20 years, seven albums and countless live shows, there are bound to be some raw nerves and differences of opinions–anyone in a band can attest to that.
The Southern California punk rockers split ways in 2004, but it didn’t last long. In early 2008, Face to Face started playing some live shows and by year’s end, the guys had a short U.S. tour booked. When the chemistry is good, the chemistry is good, Keith says. “We thought it would be fun to play a reunion show. We just kept playing more and more, Scott [Shiflett, bass] and I started to talk about some ideas for new songs… Before we knew it, we were recording a new album.”
Even with the success of the new album and tour, Keith has a strong warning to any bands trying to make it big. “You are setting yourself up for a hard life,” he says. “Being in a full-time band isn’t always easy.” Taking from his two decades of hard-earned experience in the music industry, he does have some slightly more encouraging words of advice for hopeful musicians: “No one gives a shit about what your band looks like; people do care how well you play live.”
We got to talk some more with the sole founder of Face to Face about the new album and tour, then we got deep into a few of the problems in our society.
So this is your first album support tour since 2002. How’s it going?
It’s going very well. We are having a great time out here. This is the first full headlining the United States and Canada tour we’ve done in the last nine years. We started playing shows again about three years ago.
The new album has some classic Face to Face-sounding songs and some that take a little different direction. Was that on purpose or did it just come out that way?
If you listen to our catalog, it’s not the first time we’ve had songs that were various tempos–mid-tempo to fast. This is just a record that is a collection of new ideas from Scott and I, we just wrote the songs we had ideas for in our heads. We didn’t overthink it, and we didn’t really spend too much time trying to do something for any specific purpose. There wasn’t anything planned or calculated about the record or the songs. It’s really just an honest, accurate snapshot of the way that we feel at this point in time.
On “It’s Not All About You” you say, “Everybody wants to have it made/Don’t want to do nothing but still get paid.” Do you see this as a major problem in our society?
That’s an interesting question. Basically the song is about being selfish. It’s about the mentality of wanting something for nothing. That’s ultimately what the line is about, and yeah, I would say that is definitely a huge problem, especially in the United States of America.
Do you see that selfish attitude as a recent thing? Is it more common in the younger generation?
I’ve seen it become more of an issue in my lifetime. I’m 42 years old; maybe I just notice it more now, but it doesn’t seem that it was to the degree that it is now.
Do you think there is any way to right this path we are on? Do you think it’s just going to continue to get worse?
You know I’m better at pointing out problems. I don’t claim to have the solution. A lot of my lyrics really just deal with personal trouble. They really just deal with the individual and that kind of thing. The only way something like that will be solved is through the individual. It’s about personal responsibility. It’s about trying to fix yourself first. If everyone worked on fixing themselves, I think we’d have a better society across the board.
Would you say that it is the punk rock mantra to point out the problems in society so as a group we can work on them, to try and bring underlying problems to the surface?
I have no idea man. I don’t really know what punk rock is anymore, and I hardly care. We do what we do, and I try not to worry about what punk rock means.
I read that you had Corey Miller of L.A. Ink do the album art. How’d that come about?
We’ve been buddies with Corey for the last couple years, and obviously we’ve been talking with him about working on the new record and just through hanging out and talking about it he was like, “Hey man I’d like to try and do some artwork for that.” I was kind of telling him about how some of the songs went and that gave him some really cool ideas for the art. It was really a cool spontaneous thing where he was kind of getting a little inspiration from our creativity, and we just started feeding off each other. He started making these drawings, and I was giving him song titles. It just turned into this cool cooperative thing creatively.
You guys are also stopping at some tattoo shops to help promote the album and tour?
Yeah we did a couple of those. We stopped in New York and Philadelphia as well as a few others. We actually had Corey on tour with us for a week or so and got to stop in some cool tattoo shops. We sold some of Corey’s art and some records. It was a lot of fun.
Do you have any plans now that you have a new record out?
Just touring. We are about midway through this tour–I think four or five weeks left. We still have the rest of the South, all the way up to the Pacific Northwest, Sacramento, all the way down SoCal and the rest of the Southwest. Then we are hitting the rest of the world: Europe, Australia and hopefully back down to South America all before the end of the year.
Wow, that’s quite the busy year. Still touring that much after 20 years?
Yeah we are workhorses [laughs]. It’s what we like to do.
Do you have any advice for anyone starting a band nowadays?
Yeah: Quit. Get a real job. That would be my best advice. Stay in school, go to college, get a skill. Seriously. I guess if anyone is in a band and really wants to make a go at it, you need to forget about what your band looks like or any of that bullshit. Just get out there and play shows; play a lot because it’s all about how good you are live. Now that the record industry has taken a shit you really just got to look at how well you play live and really cultivate that.
Face to Face will stop in Sacramento on June 19, 2011 to play Ace of Spades with Strung Out, Blitzkid and The Darlings. Tickets are $20 and the show starts at 6 p.m. For more info, go to Aceofspadessac.com.
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